


Full Circle

by ao_no_senshi



Series: Wind and Water [6]
Category: Chouseishin Gransazer | Super Star God Gransazer
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-11
Updated: 2010-04-11
Packaged: 2017-10-27 00:33:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/289611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ao_no_senshi/pseuds/ao_no_senshi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The plan was to get Makoto relaxed and out of leader mode. Predictably the plan fails.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Full Circle

**Author's Note:**

> Tag to episodes 48-9

Makoto paced outside the small infirmary room that held Tappei. This wasn't Akira's hospital and the JSDF doctors were stricter about who got to see their patients than Akira was. Besides, Ai was in there at the moment, talking to Tappei even if he couldn't hear her. She blamed herself for what had happened, blamed herself for keeping them divided and unable to summon Leviathan and he didn't know what to say or do that would help. He supposed it wouldn't help either that he couldn't understand why she'd made the choice she had: how could sacrificing yourself to Belzeus' schemes end the fighting?

Caught up in his thoughts he didn't hear the approaching footsteps until Jin's arm was lying across his shoulder.

"Ai still in there?" Jin asked quietly and he nodded.

"Yeah. I don't know what to say to her." He didn't trust himself to say anything, either: the last thing Ai needed now was for him to snap at her, she felt bad enough as it was without that.

There was a quiet 'hmmm' of acknowledgement, then Jin's arm moved off Makoto's shoulder, replaced with Jin's hand attaching itself to his elbow as Makoto felt himself being tugged around.

"What--"

"We're going for a drive," Jin announced. "You need a break."

"I do not."

It was annoying, Makoto thought, that Jin could ignore his protests so easily and even more irritating that he couldn't seem to get free of the other man's grip.

"You don't have to pull me," he muttered, trying to ignore the curious looks of the JSDF soldiers they passed, still trying to pull himself free. "I can walk by myself, you know."

"Yes, but if I let go you'll just walk yourself back to Tappei's room," Jin retorted. "Which would defeat the purpose of dragging you away from there in the first place."

"I won't go back," Makoto sighed, giving up on escape for the time being. "We're almost outside anyway."

"Not much further to go then," Jin agreed pleasantly. "Stop complaining. Besides," he added, "if you didn't want to come you'd have shaken me off already. You know you need this break as well as I do."

Makoto sought desperately for a comeback and came up empty. "I hate it when you're right," he muttered instead, resigning himself to being tugged out the door of the JSDF building and round to where Jin's car was parked.

***

The journey was a quiet one. At first he'd thought Jin was just planning on driving around, maybe try start up a conversation about something Makoto didn't want to talk about, so he was surprised when he realised Jin was taking them out of the city and towards...

Towards Kabuto Mountain? Why was Jin taking them there? The last time they'd been here they'd almost died: was this some weird way of saying 'Don't give up' or something? Because there had to be easier ways of saying that than to drive out here.

Jin brought the car to a stop at the bottom of the mountain and frowned, looking around with a confused expression on his face. "Why did I come here?" he wondered, letting go of the steering wheel and massaging his temples tiredly. "I should pay more attention to where I'm going."

"You didn't know you were bringing us here?" Makoto asked surprise. Was Jin more out of it than he thought? He'd seemed perfectly in control while he was driving. What if they'd run a red light or something? What if they'd hit someone?

Jin gave him a nervous grin. "Not so much?"

Makoto sighed and slumped back in his seat. "There have to been better places you could have brought us than this."

"I don't know," Jin shrugged. "It all started here for me, really. Guess it feels like it'll end here, too, for some reason. Full circle and all that."

"How did it start here?" Makoto asked, curious now in spite of his worry and frustration.

"We found Dorcrus here," Jin replied. "Mika and Professor Horiguchi found it first but they couldn't activate it."

Makoto nodded. "Mika's Flame Tribe," he agreed. "So're Tenma and Ken. They couldn't have woken Dorcrus anyway."

"Ken wasn't a Gransazer then," Jin noted. "But no, it wasn't their Chouseishin." He sighed. "And then it turned out Bosquito was hidden here as well. It's kind of ironic that it was sealed away so close to where Dorcrus was sleeping." His mouth curved up in a sardonic smile. "Or maybe not."

"Why not?" Makoto asked, his eyebrows drawing together as he tried to figure out what Jin meant.

"Because the first thing we did with Dorcrus was try to wipe out the Flame Tribe?" Jin retorted. "It wasn't exactly our finest moment."

Makoto stared at his friend, Jin's words rearranging themselves in his head until they made sense because there was no way Jin had just said what he thought he had.

"What?" Jin asked defensively. "Don't look at me like that, jeez."

"You did _what_ with Dorcrus?" Makoto demanded. Surely he had to have heard wrong. Gransazers didn't attack each other, for crying out loud.

Jin stared back at him, looking as taken aback as Makoto felt. "Didn't anyone ever tell you about Karin?" he asked eventually, after an awkward silence. "I thought somebody would have by now."

Karin. Karin... the name sounded familiar but Makoto couldn't place it. "I think I heard it somewhere," he said cautiously. "But I didn't get any details." He studied Jin carefully, wondering what he was about to find out. Jin always seemed so laid back and got on with everyone, it was hard to imagine he'd once, what, been on the opposite side? How could that happen?

Jin sighed and leant back in his seat, staring up at the trees. "Typical," he muttered. "I can't believe you've gone this long without hearing about it. Well," he started, "We thought she was a woman called Saeki Karin: a space engineer who stumbled over some highly classified technology, including a crystal slab."

"Like the slab the Professor has?" Makoto asked and Jin nodded.

"Yeah, like that, only it told a different story: Earth was destroyed because Humanity was fighting among itself and it was the Gransazers mission to stop that happening again. The Flame Tribe were abusing their powers and would destroy the earth if they weren't stopped first." Jin sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "We believed her. Not our smartest move ever."

Makoto nodded silently: that made more sense than what he'd been thinking. "So what happened after that?" he asked. "When did you realise what was going on?"

Jin winced. "A lot of things happened. I'd rather not talk about them right now, though: they're not exactly things I'm proud of, you know?"

"Alright," Makoto agreed, watching Jin carefully, taking in how tense Jin was and the regret in his eyes. "You made some bad decisions and then?" He didn't need to know details right now and if Jin wanted to talk about it later, he would. There was no rush.

"Ryoko-san and I left," Jin continued, giving Makoto a faint smile of thanks for not pushing. "It was pretty tense at the time: Ryoko-san and Akira were gearing up to fight but we were interrupted when the JSDF ambushed us. Ryoko-san and I went one way, Akira stayed with Karin." Jin paused, stretching in his seat, his shirt rucking up as his arms stretched over his head. "He really loved her," he said a moment later, slumping back down. "Refused to see what she was until even he couldn't deny it anymore. And the weird thing? I think she loved him, too. 'Even if I destroyed the world, you alone I wouldn't kill.'"

"What was she?" Makoto prompted when the silence had gone on too long, Jin staring into the distance with an expression that was almost... wistful, in a way, caught up in memories Makoto knew nothing about. "This Saeki Karin. What was she?"

Jin straightened up again, snapping out of it and reaching out to tap his fingers against the steering wheel. "An Akelon. So it's not really a surprise he didn't trust Ruby when she showed up."

"No," Makoto agreed slowly. "No, it isn't. So after that you joined up with the Flame Tribe?"

"And the Earth Tribe," Jin agreed. "Although they weren't really united then. You guys showed up not long after and we were all one big happy Gransazer family."

"Along with the resulting sibling squabbles," Makoto agreed dryly. "We've come a long way since then. All of us."

Jin nodded. "And it's almost over," he said quietly, looking up at the sky and the fleet of ships in space waiting for the order to attack. "One way or another."

The distant look was back, along with a bleakness that didn't belong in Jin's eyes and Makoto felt himself reaching out before he realised what he was doing, his fingers brushing against Jin's cheek as the other man turned to face him. They stayed frozen like that for a moment and Makoto wondered if he should move or something, because this was pushing the boundaries of the unspoken agreement that had sprung up between them, bordering on an intimacy that was both exhilarating and terrifying. Everything else about them he understood, but this was something new.

"We'll win," he said firmly, not budging, willing his friend to believe him. "We're not going to let the earth be destroyed. Alright?"

Jin's mouth quirked upwards. "Is this your way of saying don't give up?"

"Absolutely." He might not be the Wind Tribe's leader, but he could fake it for a moment, especially if happy-go-lucky Jin, of all people, was on the verge of giving up.

Jin laughed softly and Makoto reluctantly let go, his fingers trailing along Jin's jawline before dropping back to his side. "You know," Jin said, still smiling, "this was supposed to be about getting you _out_ of leader mode for a while, not keeping you in it to listen to me babbling."

Makoto shrugged. He was, surprisingly, feeling better. Not as tense as he had been when Jin had unceremoniously kidnapped him. "I don't mind," he told his friend, his hands cupping the back of his head as he stared up at the canopy of trees. "Besides, I'm pretty sure being dragged off into the woods with you isn't a bad thing."

Jin snorted, his arm slapping lightly against Makoto's stomach. "Flattery will get you everywhere."

"I try."

It felt like they sat there forever, caught up in a companiable silence that neither wanted to break. Until, of course, one of them had to.

"We should probably get back," Jin said eventually, as reluctant to go as Makoto felt. "Otherwise the others will start wondering where we are."

Makoto nodded. "I should check on Tappei," he agreed. "And talk to Ai, make sure she's holding up okay."

"A leader's work is never done," Jin commented lightly, turning the key in the ignition and starting up the car's engine. "I'm glad I'm not one."

"You do fine," Makoto told him, closing his eyes as the car pulled into motion. "You're bossy enough as it is."

"I'm not bossy," Jin retorted.

"Interfering?"

"I just like to know what's going on," Jin protested. "And someone has to reason with all you stubborn, stoic types otherwise you'd repress yourselves into oblivion."

"That's very noble of you."

"Isn't it, though?" Jin agreed, pulling away from the mountain and towards the highway that would take them back to Tokyo. "It's a tough job, but someone has to do it."


End file.
